This post will probably be 34561. 561, now, just for example, is square free AND a Carmichael number, a sort of pseudo-prime.

"The composite integer n is a Carmichael number if bn-1 = 1 (mod n) for every integer b which is relatively prime with n.

Carmichael numbers behave like prime numbers with respect to the most useful primality test, that is they pretend to be prime."

As for "34", it's a wild one: it is the smallest number with the property that it and its neighbors have the same number of divisors # 34 is the magic constant of a 4 by 4 magic square # 34 is the alphanumeric value of ONE.

Chere Eisley: I have indeed swum in lakes and have faced tornados, if not forest fires, on the ocean. The simple reason of course is that forests do not grow in the ocean, aside from kelp forests which do not go in for the forest-fire shtick. But if I merited your rejoinder I would find it stunning, and I have decided never again to contemplate flying up any librarian's nose.

My comment expressed general disbelief that any creature, however small (or large) that had been granted the wings of a turtle-dove would be capable, much less desirous, of flying up the nose of any librarian, however long (or short) said nose may be. Actually, capability takes a lesser place here to advisability.

So, rendered out of Dutch (as you all knew, of course) is my exclamation: What do you know about a forest fire on the ocean? You haven't even been swimming in a lake!

If you're too lazy to go out to Google Translate and just try the Mudcat translate link you're not likely to get something that can be flogged into meaning, at least not with that last batch. Or so it seems. I have been dumbing down some of the Google toolbar links, but perhaps I should put that icon back.

LOL!! OK, Little Hawk, have it your way. Roger and Mimi actually made their living translating Washing Instruction labels into English for the Korean garment industry until they retired to live out of a small Winnebago and drive around the country together in 1992. They put a small punt on the roof of their WInnebago so he could go fishing at various ponds around the country and two lightweight bicycles on the rear, strapped to the spare. They were very happy, but Roger (who always enjoyed a lot of cholesterol) keeled over trying to find his way through the Beltway one summer as they were crossing DC on their way to Mimi's annual Cross-Stitching convention in east Annapolis. The heart attack was fatal, but the Winnebago survived because they had just pulled over to the shoulder in the middle of rush hour to unfold their map of Greater DC. Sobered and grieved, but courageous, Mimi soldiered on and to this day is a regular feature at Cross-Stitch conventions all across this great land of ours, as well as a regular attendee at Amway team rallies. There never was a plastics vacuum-molding company in their lives. Mimico was their pet name for a ragged and surly calico cat who was put to sleep at the age of thirteen years and the weight of twenty-seven pounds just before they sold the house in White Plains to start their odyssey.

This is a tradition into which we have been instructed by the fearless Rapaire, Master of all Things Cloudy and Pretentious: if you have nothing to say of much merit, just run it through Google translations and say it anyway. It will make you look very knowledgeable and no-one bothers to translate it back.

For the benefit of Anglophiles and Hsitory my two posts read:

"Up a long ladder and down a short rope Here's to King Billy, to hell wit' the Pope. An' if that won't do, we'll cut him in two, And send him to hell with yer red white and blue."

...which I believe is an Irish Protestant prayer of some kind.

THe other one was a simple sentiment:

"If I had the wings of a turtle-dove, I would fly up the long nose of a librarian."

We can take that sort of thing in our stride, Eiseley. Most of us have already mastered disciplines such as reciting the multiplication tables backwards in order to retain our sanity during the water torture procedure.

Mimico is actually a small unprofitable vacuum-molding plastics company out on RFD17 about eleven miles outside of Spawspot PA. It is a one-story shabby-looking industrial building set among unmowed weeds, with several cars and a bass trawler boat permanently parked in the rear parking lot. Mimico was founded in 1975 by Roger Mim and his wife Mimi of Spawspot. They still make a somewhat bumpy living turning out the upper halves of various beach balls and other inflatables.

Well, anyone who can rhyme "Rapaire" with anything at all while disinfecting his noxious nihilistic narcissism has got to be all right in my book. We hope despite the demands of Motherhood, Pi-hood, and Walker-hood that you stay in the Neighborhood, as we need all the pals we can muster to the barricades when the Manne of Booques start redesigning the Universe as a bad-hair day in the library...

Wow! What a wonderful welcome---words streaming across the bottom and everything. I do find myself thinking of all the other meanings every word has---knowing that you will all pick up on any hidden or intended or unintended puns.

Darn, I should have kept notes! I must admit that some of the funniest posts were ones I read in the wee hours of the morning, or sometimes at work when I couldn't do more than go in the back room and quiver with laughter.

It'll all come out, though, the memories of posts I wished I could comment on, but realized the time for the comment was years in the past . . .

As for roadkill, there are a few too many squirrels here that have recently met their maker. Too bad there's so little meat on their bones at this time of year. There's nothing like a delicious squirrel lasagna, but it's better to wait until August or September.

Reading the MOAB without remarking until now shows incredible fortitude; the urge to comment must have been strong at times. And I wonder how many monitors and keyboards you replaced after rapid drink expulsions during the time? I have to say, some of the funniest bits of nonsense have turned up in here (a couple of all time favorites came from BWL and the rare visits by John Hardly). Bruce's story about the neighbors dogs being rounded up in his yard just sends me off into gales of laughter every time I read it (I did a cut and paste and I think I've saved it to a couple of other threads around here).

I admit to having a quiver-full of guest appearances around the MOAB; LH isn't the only one. Some of us just don't have such a reputation so can get away with brief appearances. Who knows how many have channeled the freds and gluon? Lots of the time I read along and add remarks just to keep it near the top of the page or so I can tell where I left off reading.

Having just finished your survey, did you see any unique or recurring characters that you'd like to know more about, or have turn up again? Remind us who they were and perhaps the creator will come forward or arrange an encore.

As far as participating at Mudcat, there are storytellers and non-musical folks interested in music who are members. There are some who never set foot in the musical portion of the site, though reading through up there is how you can really take the measure of the place. The brainpower in the music section is phenomenal and I've enjoyed some incredible conversations and research discussions up there.

Now, before someone comes along and loudly protests that this isn't BS, I'll stop. But hope to see you in a few other threads.

MOM baked some of her blueberry muffins and put on a pot of coffee, so stop by in the kitchen and help yourself. Just watch out for that jar of milky stuff in the fridge. If you want cream, you're better off with the powdered creamer on the table--I think the jar has something cut up for fishing bait. It belongs to one of the boys. The fridge hasn't smelled right for a week. (You absolutely don't want to look in the freezer. All of us have put road kill in there, and I don't think any of us have skinned them out like we planned. Sorry about that.)

Eisely, it's what happens when any group of talkative people with time on their hands get together. This sort of thing used to happen in coffee shops and local bistros. (sigh) Those days are fading fast. It now happens on the Internet. The internet is a little different, because no one can see that you're only half-dresssed and your hair is a mess when you're on the Internet! ;-)

If I wrote this in verse, It would be much worse, So I won't even try So just prose you'll descry In the rest of this post.

I am a 43-year-old graduate student, a single mother, a full-time worker, a reader, a walker, and more. I sometimes wear all those hats at the same time. I live out west. Last fall, when I was in my first semester of graduate school, I was taking an online storytelling class. One of the internet links for the class led me to the Mudcat Café. I had seen the café once before, or at least heard tales about it from a friend, but decided that the link I found in the class was a bit of an invitation, so I set up a moniker and began to dabble. Shortly thereafter, (on September 14, 2009) and tragically, the man I was dating died of a heart attack. Distracted by grief, I decided to distract myself by reading the riveting and sometimes usually always irreverently engaging posts I found in the café. Then I stumbled across the MOAB. Now, I'm not really very comfortable posting comments to strangers in anonymity, but I was fascinated (and sometimes horrified) by the cadre of folks who posted to the Mother of All BS Threads. So, not wanting to miss anything, I began reading from the beginning. I can't tell you how many times my computer would freeze up until I learned to "trace" the messages! I read off and on, sometimes avidly, sometimes skimming, until finally last week I reached the most recent posts. I still can't believe you folks have been BS-ing for all this time! But now you feel like old friends to me. When I found the "how to morph photos" website, I screwed up my courage and decided to subtly say hallo.

So, for the past six months you've all helped me unwittingly through a difficult time. Thank you! And if it's all right with y'all, I'll pop in every now and then. I'd love to have a forum for some of the twiddle that bounces around in my head!

My only concern is that the friend who showed me Mudcat years ago may feel that my intrusion is an invasion of privacy. Hmmm, I'll have to give that particular situation some thought. In the meantime, Howdy!

Have to ask, for the fit just seems too seamless for a complete newbie. Of course, it could be you were previously an inhabitant of our twin world, located in the galaxy FUBAR in one of the universes immediately parallel to this one, and which we have reason to believe was recently visited by Gluon. Perhaps you got tangled in his broken leash as he dashed madly for home and MOAB and was dragged here willy-nilly through the recent wormhole that exited up through the privy behind the Legion Hovel? Though at first disoriented, you perhaps soon experienced a sense of deja vu? If that is the case, hope you like it here, for alas, the wormhole is no longer connected. One of the Legionnaire's had a particularly bad case of gas - so bad, in fact, that he could not leave the privy for several weeks. I'm afraid the damage in Haiti, Chili and off the coast of Sumatra were some of the minor repercussions. One major effect is the exit to that wormhole, while still in this universe, was blasted several galaxies away.

So, here's the question: Eiseley - are you new to Mudcat, or is it that you have a new Mudcat moniker?

34,000+, Yes. I think I've read it all. Talk about a novel without a plot, or does this have thousands of subplots!? Oh well, at least I won't be shot by Mark Twain. I think I may have missed some in the 400s or 500s. My life was a bit crazy back in November. Oh, I guess it is still a bit crazy. But whose isn't?

"... Henceforth, post all BS here in this thread. Soon there will be only one BS thread. We won't have to look for particular threads as this will be the only one and it will contain all the BS we have to offer.

My Gawd!! Why has this not been thought of earlier? It is so obvious!

I swear, sometimes I even amaze myself!

Once again, for those of you who are slow in understanding...hear me, Tweed! Post all BS in this thread from now on!"

Ludwig von Mises: What characterizes capitalism is not the bad taste of the crowds, but the fact that these crowds, made prosperous by capitalism, became consumers of literature of course, of trashy literature. The book market is flooded by a downpour of trivial fiction for the semibarbarians. But this does not prevent great authors from creating imperishable works.

It is perhaps a GReat Woe that we can intensely inject beauty, refined thought and vast depths of cleverness into our work, and then have them stall completely at the Customs Barrier on the bridge into Shared Reality, n'est-ce pas?